Josef was still trying to get her up when he heard the clank of enormous footsteps coming toward him. Leaving Nico with a curse, he drew his swords with a singing scrape of metal and turned to face the enormous man closing the distance between them.
But the man wasn’t looking at him. He didn’t even seem to notice the blades in Josef’s hands. He was staring at the girl lying on the floor.
“You were hard to find, little demon.” His deep voice was still terrible, but it was at least mostly human this time. “I don’t know how you hid yourself, but no matter. No one hides from the League forever.”
Josef stepped over Nico and took up position between her and the approaching man. “What did you do to her?” he shouted. It looked like wizard stuff to him, but Eli had always told him wizards couldn’t control other people.
“League benefit,” the man said, walking slowly. “I gave the spirits around her something to do. The League is the arm of the White Lady, so their nature binds them to my command when it comes to demon hunting. They’ll stay like that, squishing her down, until I tell them otherwise.”
Josef had no clue what the man was talking about, but he had other worries. Now that he was out of the deep shadows, the man wasn’t as large as Josef had initially thought, but he was no less a monster. He stood seven feet tall at least, and was wide enough to make his height seem normal. His head was shaved clean, and scars that stood out white against his deeply tanned skin ran from the top of his skull to the tops of his bushy eyebrows. A long cut had scarred his face into a permanent sneer, and his nose was crooked from multiple breaks. He looked like a man who’d spent his life brawling, and he carried his enormous frame with a fighter’s grace. Across his bare chest, he wore a wide, red sash festooned with a host of strange objects—jeweled rings, sword hilts, necklaces, talismans, and even, Josef cringed, a preserved hand curled in a fist.
Above the ghastly collection, a long black coat with a high collar sat awkwardly on the man’s monstrous shoulders. The sleeves were ripped off, revealing muscular arms covered in mismatched tattoos. The coat looked too small for him, but anything would look small on this man. Anything, that is, except the sword he wore at his side. That suited him perfectly. Its pommel was the size of an orange, and the hilt was wrapped in thick leather until it was almost as large as the guard above it. He wore it naked, with no sheath, the dark blade out and lying bare against his coat so that the wicked, toothed edge tore at the fabric until the dark cloth was nearly in tatters. It was eerily familiar, but the blade looked so at home on the man’s hip that it took Josef a few moments to recognize it as the sword he’d seen in Slorn’s workshop.
“Ah,” Sted said, laying a hand on the sword’s hilt. “You like my new baby, yes? You must be the demon’s guardian.” He looked Josef up and down. “Aren’t you a bit puny to be the master of the Heart of War?”
Josef ignored him. “Who are you? What are you here for?”
“What kind of question is that?” Sted cackled. “Don’t you see the jacket?” He flipped his torn collar. “I’m Berek Sted, best killer in the League of Storms, and I’m here to kill the demon.”
Josef raised his swords. “You’ll find that harder than you think.”
“Really?” Sted laughed. “I like you, swordsman. Tell you what, I’ll make you a deal. See, I kind of owe you. When I got to Gaol, I couldn’t find the girl. I’ve never been good at finding demons and all that League mumbo jumbo. But I could feel the Heart.” His scarred face grew almost wistful. “Any swordsman worth the name can feel a sword like that. It’s a force of nature. So I followed it and waited and, sure enough, here you are. I hate owing people, so how about I make you a deal to call it even?”
Josef scowled. “What kind of deal?”
“A fighting chance,” Sted said. “It goes like this: You give me a good fight, something to make me remember why I put up with the League. If you beat me, I’ll let the girl go and tell old Alric I couldn’t find the demon.”
Josef stared at the man. “Wait,” he said. “You’re a member of the League of Storms, and you’re offering to let the demon go if I fight you and win?”
Sted shrugged. “The League is work, you know? You look like you know how to give a good fight, and I always say pleasure before work. Anyway,” he chuckled, “it’s not like I’ll lose.”
Josef glanced down at Nico. She was still on the floor, prone and flat against the boards. He did a quick calculation in his head. They had a little under half an hour before they were supposed to meet the elder Monpress and Eli at the wall. Not much time, but it wasn’t like he could ask the man to wait. He’d just have to be quick. In any case, he thought as his hand tightened on his sword, wasn’t this the kind of challenge he’d been looking for?